


The Audit

by phrynewrites



Category: RuPaul's Drag Race (US) RPF
Genre: Comedy, F/F, Fluff, Romance, Sitcom AU, and maybe some angst later, look it's just lesbian parks and rec, public service AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-19
Updated: 2020-10-19
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:00:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27093937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phrynewrites/pseuds/phrynewrites
Summary: Lanmore sits as a shining city on a hill, plagued by high taxes, high gas prices, and disinterested city hall employees. That is, until, the state auditor rolls into town and demands accountability.
Relationships: Brooke Lynn Hytes/Vanessa Vanjie Mateo, Monét X Change/Nina West, Scarlet Envy/Yvie Oddly
Comments: 7
Kudos: 14





	The Audit

**Author's Note:**

> Major thanks and love to @janssports (artificialmeggie)for her incredible betaing and @scarletenvy (rbcch) for consistent love and support!

In the simple town of Lanmore, Virginia — where the grass trimmings lay on the sidewalks until the next storm washes them away, where the sun burns heavy on every blacktop in every strip mall parking lot, where the flag blows freely and haphazardly — it is quiet. 

It is all quiet until Vanjie hefts a Wal-Mart bag, filled to the brim with loose packets of SweeTarts, onto the freshly waxed conference room table. She dumps them out, all good and messy, letting them brush against A’keria and Nina’s piles of citizen suggestions, and spill off onto the floor. 

And there were at least a hundred suggestions at A’keria and Nina’s end of the table, sorted haphazardly into Bad, Extra Spicy Bad, and Wrong Department piles. They pass workable suggestions directly to Silky or Vanjie to turn nonsense into gold with their keen understanding of Lanmore and its  _ specific breed  _ of citizen, until they spit out a new program to address the concern. Or the suggestion goes to Scarlet, who brings it to Yvie, who then handles the issue swiftly—and loudly— like she always does.

“So you’re tellin’ me—” Silky reaches across the table and snatches a packet of candy. “That these hos found a way to snort this?” She dangles it between her well manicured nails, as though it were a little bag of dog shit found next to the trash can in Smallman Park. 

“They ain’t hos, Silk. They’re like....” Licking her finger, A’keria ponders the hoes as she flips through another stack of suggestion slips rescued from their cardboard box, which lived under Scarlet’s desk, more specifically underneath Scarlet’s balled up fuzzy socks and “secret files,” which no one really wanted to investigate, lest they get trapped in Scarlet’s world by spending too much time with her thoughts. “I don’t know, like, twelve year old boys. They’re just stupid.” 

Nina turns around, capping her marker. “Twelve year olds can’t be hos. They’re twelve.”

“You can be a ho and be twelve.” Another flip. A’keria crumples a suggestion slip and launches it at the Extra Spicy Bad pile, missing and hitting Scarlet’s feet. 

The Extra Spicy Bad pile held all the suggestions that A’keria took great pleasure in reading out to the group during happy hour, in the traditional Monthly Suggestion Box Clean-Out fashion — in the corner booth at Chewy George’s bar, sat halfway in Silky’s lap, drunk from three blended margaritas, sticking her favorites into her bra, so she could hang them on her desk when she got back to work the next day.

Scarlet turns in her chair and snorts. “Wouldn’t you know,” she says easily, teasingly light.

“Please, you wish you were,” A’keria shoots back, half her attention still on the suggestion slip in front of her. 

With a laugh, Scarlet clutches pearls she’s not even wearing. “Excuse me, I’m a lady.” She brightens, splaying out her hands on the conference table, accidentally bumping the Bad pile. “Brigid treated me to a lovely dinner and show last night, sooo. That’s lady-like shit.” 

“You’re excused,” Silky adds, but not before she can join Vanjie in rolling her eyes at Scarlet’s remarks.

“She’s not a ho and neither are you, so shut up.” Yvie booms from the front office in that unmistakably Yvie way — loudly inviting herself into a conversation happening in a completely different room, which she has no part of. Such are the powers of being the director. 

“Course she chimes in now.” A’keria rolls her eyes before handing Nina a suggestion. “This one’s actually good.” 

Vanjie trails away from A’keria and back to the candy. She whips off her shoe, holding the orange suede pump by its blocky heel, and starts pounding the candy mercilessly, throwing her whole body into it. Once, twice, three times, before she shifts her bare foot on top of her other shoe to redistribute her weight. She continues pounding, even as Silky reaches across her to grab a packet of candy, mesmerized by how Vanjie swings her shoe with a vengeance. 

She rips it open and carefully pops a SweeTart in her mouth. “So how do these kids even get to snortin’ this shit?” 

“You can do anything when you’re stupid enough.” A’keria begins folding the suggestion into a paper airplane, crumpling the nose of it when it doesn’t look pointy enough. 

Silky waves a SweeTart in front of Vanjie’s mouth until she opens, letting Silky place it on her tongue. “But what are they getting out of this? Is it like drugs, or...?” 

“They snort it, Silk,” Vanjie switches the shoe around to pound with the heel. She gives it a good whack and looks up at Silky with wide eyes. “That’s how they get to snortin it.” 

“Yeah but they snort it and then what?” 

“I guess you guys better…” 

Nina shoots A’keria a look and mouths  _ do not _ .

“Maybe we should try it and find out?” Scarlet adds, before taking the paper airplane from A’keria, looking over her shoulder, scooting her chair out into the hallway, kicking off of the door frame, and launching herself toward Yvie’s office. 

She rolls through the open door, and in one swift move, hands Yvie the airplane, captures the stack of papers Yvie’s waving with a smile, and rolls over to the photocopier next to her desk, yelling behind her, “That’s three points.” Yvie marks the tallies on a Post-It. She’ll put it into the spreadsheet later.

Nina turns back to the candy and opens her mouth. She wants to say something, but instead mashes her lips and shakes her head. Vanjie and Silky mumble “stupid kids,” and “they got nothing to do but dumb shit,” and “you’d probably try snorting candy to get out of reading  _ Lord of the Flies _ too, Mary,” as they take turns pounding the candy with Vanjie’s shoe. 

“I did not,  _ Scarlet _ did” A’keria drawls, judging that the suggestion of “No more traffic lights. I’m sick of fines and I want to drive like a man” as stupid enough to earn its spot in the “Bad Box.” She crumples it up and tosses it away.

Nina grabs another paper, breaking into a sigh as she scans over the first line. 

“Marty the Giraffe and I had a real connection. He ate leaves out of my hand. Who can I call about adopting him?” Nina reads slowly, carefully, as though the sentences were not basic, as though there must be some deeper meaning to glean from the citizen report. 

“Gimme that.” Vanjie says, grasping the air until Nina scoots around the table and fits the paper between her fingers. “We’re gonna try some  _ Rizzoli and Isles _ shit, Silk.” 

Silky comes up from under the table, having grabbed Vanjie’s other shoe clean off her foot. She smacks the candy with the heel. “What’s  _ Rizzoli and Isles _ ?” She hits it again, once more, with feeling.

“Like crime ladies who investigate drugs and the one is tough and wears leather jackets and also hot and the other looks at dead people and keeps them chocolate Ho Hos in her desk.”

“Oh my god,” Yvie drawls from her office, watching as Scarlet rolls back in with the photocopies and two pink Starbursts from the candy bowl she keeps on her desk. She breaks her gaze. “None of you are hos.”

A’keria smirks and flips over her phone with a sly smile, before sliding it across the table over to Silky. “Brightness down.” 

Vanjie grabs it instead, glances down for a split second, and lets the phone drop into her lap “God, my lesbian eyes.” 

“I didn’t know eyes could be lesbian,” Silky mutters, snatching up the phone and turning the brightness back up. She nods, and decisively states, “ho.” 

“Everything’s lesbian. That’s how it works. Head, shoulders, knees and toes, Mary,” Vanjie sings, poking Silky. 

“And how is your head?” A’keria calls across the table, fishing a slip out of the box. “Nevermind I found it.” 

Dropping her shoe back on the table with a clean thud, Vanjie throws herself across the table grasping for the slip. 

“It says Vanjie’s tongue is so sloppy…” A’keria pauses to clear her throat. 

“How sloppy is it?” Scarlet calls back

“It don’t say shit. Gimme that.” Vanjie grabs the slip and quick stuffs it down her shirt. “There, now you won’t get it.” She pushes herself up and walks back to her side of the table, looking pleased with herself. 

A’keria rolls her eyes and turns to Nina. “You wanna get it?” She points at Vanjie, who is now pulling out her credit card. “I won’t even tell HR.” A’keria laughs, and Nina blushes furiously at the thought of HR, which only makes A’keria laugh harder. 

Vanjie separates the powdered candy with her credit card and turns to Silky. “We’re gonna try it, Riz.”

With a shrug, Silky pops her finger into her mouth, sticks it into the pile of candy, and then back into her mouth. “Why don’t they just eat it the regular way?” she mumbles around her finger. 

“Because they’re fucking stupid,” A’keria drawls. “That’s how kids are. Fucking stupid.” 

“Well, not all of them,” Nina chimes in before sliding another slip to Vanjie. “Here’s a suggestion I think you guys can do something with.” 

Vanjie takes up the slip and sets it to the side before taking up the one about the giraffe, rolling it into a thin straw with precision. “Just the stupid ones.” 

“Y’all are a bunch of clowns.” A’keria shakes her head as Vanjie cuts the candy into lines. 

Vanjie ignores her and turns to Silky. “So, I couldn’t really understand the principal, on account of he sounded like one of those grown ups in those  _ Peanuts _ cartoons, with Charlie Brown and that dog and shit. But anyway, he said he saw them snortin’ it through the milk straws during lunch period. And then that mom started goin’ off in the office about the police and Reagan and the War on Drugs, and then I stopped listenin’ so…” 

“That’s fucked up,” Yvie yells, unwrapping a Starburst. 

“Yes it is, Yvangeline. Yes it is,” Vanjie replies, ungrateful for Yvie’s input, before turning back to Silky. “So I take my card and make it into a thin line, like this. And now you got to get something like a dollar bill like they do in the movies or some other paper shit.” 

Silky sticks the rolled up suggestion slip into Vanjie’s hand. 

“So you just make a roll, and then you get one end to your nose and the other to the line and, like, you just sniff it up.” She plugs one side of her nose, imitating a sniff, but coming out more like a snorting pig on Benadryl. 

Yvie glances up from her freshly printed budget papers, and flashes eyes filled with exhaustion and slight amusement toward the group in the conference room. “Guys, we really don’t need to practice snorting candy to see why it’s a problem that middle schoolers are making fake designer drugs out of candy.” She turns to Scarlet. “Hit me.” 

“Another Starburst?” 

“No, like with a big piece of wood, a lead pipe, your hand.” Yvie huffs, looking over the spreadsheets. “We’re fucked.”

Scarlet rests her hand over Yvie’s shoulder with a giggle. “You don’t try hard enough to be fucked.” 

Yvie lets out a tight laugh, ignoring the warmth of Scarlet’s touch and focusing again on the budgetary discretion spreadsheet. 

Scarlet gives her one more pat before walking back out of the office. “Yeah guys, it’s kind of inappropriate.”

“Yeah guys, it’s kind of inappropriate,” Silky mutters into the powder, imitating Scarlet’s high-pitched whine, making Vanjie and A’keria snicker. She rolls up her own suggestion slip, presses it to her nose, and bends over the conference table. 

Scarlet rolls her eyes, shoving her chair back toward her desk.

“Well, here I go.” Silky shrugs, making a sign of the cross and taking a deep breath. She holds her finger to her left nostril before shooting up at the sound of a nail tapping at the window behind her and Scarlet screaming at the sight of the blonde woman it belonged to. 

The woman has her nose pressed against the window, peering in eerily, eyes wide and cold at the sight in front of her. 

The air in the office sinks, quickly becoming dense and stifling. Silky releases the paper from her limp hand, A’keria drops her phone into her lap, and Scarlet’s chair slams right into her filing cabinet, knocking her pictures to the floor with a shatter. 

“What’s going on in there?” Yvie yells, standing in her door frame. Then she sees it, the scowling blond woman rounding the corner into her department. 

The combination of the woman’s angrily clicking heels; Scarlet sitting in a pile of broken glass — from a picture of her and Brigid last Christmas at the city’s tree lighting — and cutting her fingers while trying to clean it up; Silky holding up Vanjie’s shoe; Vanjie bent over a table with candy “drugs” in front of her; and A’keria throwing a paper airplane that hits the newly arrived and even more agitated blonde lady in the chest; makes Yvie want to bite down on her hand until she sees blood. 

She resists the urge, however, because Nina taught her that was a bad way to manage stress. So she breathes in for eight counts and out for eight more. It donesn’t work, but repeating “fucking Christ” over and over in her mind helps a little, even if it’s not a Monet Invented Nina Approved Official Stress Relief Strategy. 

The woman clears her throat and picks up the airplane. She unfolds it and reads carefully, in a disinterested, even tone, “I lost my water bottle here. It is blue.” 

Nina staggers out of the conference room, the rest of the team shuffling after her, still disheveled, but not more disheveled than they are on a typical Tuesday morning. “That was for our boss.”

The woman looks them over, her well groomed brows taut. “Why does your boss need to know this?” She shakes her head, as though looking over the team provided her with all she needs to know. Instead, she crumples the paper airplane, just as Vanjie begins to interject about a city-wide reusable water bottle program. “Would someone like to tell me what is going on in this department?” 

Silky folds her hands. Scarlet looks between Yvie and her now bloody fingers, before getting up, wiping them on her skirt, and slotting in between Silky and Vanjie. A’keria and Vanjie exchange glances before turning to look at Yvie as well. Nina stands still, silent as possible, fiddling with the button on her cardigan, as though it were of sudden interest. 

The blonde nods and follows their line of sight, heels clicking against the cracked tile floor as she strides toward Yvie’s office, coming to a firm halt in front of her. Breaking into a smirk, she runs her index finger over Yvie’s name plate. 

“Director Oddly, is it?” she asks in a tone that suggests she already knows the answer, yet she accompanies the question with a tilt of her head, awaiting a response.

Yvie walks out into the department, takes one look at the scowling blonde woman, and mutters, “Oh, fuck me.” Her head pulls back and she closes her eyes, inhaling deeply for eight counts, just like Nina taught her. When she opens her eyes, all she sees is the brown water stain in the warped ceiling tiles—which Scarlet referred to as “The Amoeba” and Vanessa parodied into “Miss Amoeba Edwards, for your consideration, yass gawd.” If only she could laugh upon seeing the silly looking stain, pretend for a moment that the blonde woman and her obnoxious tone would disappear.

But when she looks forward again, she finds her still there. Yvie exhales once more for eight counts and looks at the woman squarely, sternly, her lips forming a tight line, eyes firm and unyielding. 

The last time that look saw the fluorescent light of the office was July 24, 2017, at approximately 2:30 p.m., when Silky cut the office’s only AUX cord in half because she couldn’t take any more of Scarlet’s Christmas Spotify playlist, droning out “Blue Christmas” from the small speaker on the windowsill, claiming that “Christmas in July isn’t a real holiday, it’s a day for capitalists, and no, I don’t care if your girlfriend made you that playlist, I won’t listen to ‘Frosty the Snowman’ while I sweat my whole ass off.” 

Scarlet bites the inside of her cheek. This is bad. 

Yvie raises her gaze to meet the woman’s, grinds her teeth, and replies with a curt, “Yes.” 

She extends her hand, which Yvie unceremoniously shakes, before letting them drop. “I imagine you are to be their supervisor then, and yet, they are clearly unsupervised.” The woman takes in the disarray of the office and the embarrassed expressions of the employees, and continues. “So I must ask, of course, why exactly you have one employee teaching another employee how to do drugs off of  _ my  _ desk, while looking at another employee’s nude pictures, while your secretary rolls back and forth between you and the conference room, creating as many safety hazards as possible in the process, just to make sure she doesn’t miss out on everyone crumpling up suggestions from concerned citizens and playing a game with our constituents’ lives.” 

“I’m not a—” Scarlet begins before the woman looks at her.

“Well, technically we’re not elected,” Yvie mutters, hoping the woman might just catch it, burning for an argument strong enough to get her out of her department. “So, not constituents, per say…”

“Also, it’s not drugs, it’s candy because we got a call from Charles Middle that kids are crushing up this candy and it’s got to do with DARE and… Anyway it’s not drugs and we’re trying to figure out what’s up there,” Silky digresses.

The woman rubs between her brows, urging them to unfurrow. “No, you misunderstand me. It was a rhetorical question to emphasize that you, a group of grown adults, being paid with tax-payer money, could not possibly be allowed to supervise yourselves.” 

“Well, technically, I do supervise them,” Yvie adds, again, growing more irate at this conversation.

“Please.” The woman brushes it off, “If you’re aware that your department is throwing around paper airplanes made of suggestion forms, then you’re clearly complicit in their misuse of time and resources.” 

“Only the good ones become paper airplanes.” Nina shrugs. “The bad ones are crumpled, that’s how we sort.”

“You heard it, that’s how they sort.” Yvie gestures to the group before snapping, like her patience had been pulled taut for far too long. 

“I’m sorry, who are you?” she says, clearly not sorry. 

The woman continues, unfazed. 

“So we just ignore concerns?” She looks to the ground, before crouching down to snatch up a crumpled paper. She chokes a snide laugh, unfurls it, and continues. “A slip from a concerned citizen, writing into your suggestion box. And it says.” She pauses, face twisting, eyes widening, before returning to her previously cold countenance. “It says: The Mexicans are throwing cocaine over the fence and I’m scared one of them will become strong enough to throw it into Virginia. You need to stop them.” She turns the paper over. “Sincerely, Jenny Miller.” 

Vanjie grabs the slip from her hands, pouring over the words before recrumpling it and shooting the paper ball into the trash can behind Scarlet’s desk. “That’s fucking racist, Jenny.” 

“Yeah, that’s fucked up,” Silky pipes up, rubbing her fingers together to get rid of the candy dust. 

“Vanj is right, it’s racist, and either way, no one could throw that far, Jenny,” Scarlet drawls, bobbing her head. “We’re a hundred miles from Mexico, at least.” 

The woman lets out an exasperated huff, not even touching upon the poor display of geographical awareness. It’s Virginia, for fuck’s sake. “Who’s Vanj?” 

Pulling at her bottom lip with her teeth, Yvie points with her pen, releasing her lip as she replies, “The one who took the suggestion slip from you, threw it in the trash, and called Jenny a racist.” She crosses her arms. “And again, who are you?” 

The woman pulls back her blazer and taps at her badge. Vanjie tries to look like she’s still offended, but it’s harder by the minute. 

“My name is Brooke Lynn Hytes, and I’m your state auditor.” She fishes around in her purse, undisturbed by Yvie’s tightening glance as she scans over her employees. “And you’ve just made my job  _ exceptionally  _ easy.” Finding her notebook, she scans the room, recording something with a scowl before closing it up and placing it on the reception desk before Scarlet can even raise her finger in protest.

Yvie rings her hands out, fears confirmed. A’keria catches the look, and mutters her own, “Ugh, Jesus.” 

“Now I was told that your conference room is the only free one within city hall, therefore it will become my office for my tenure. So I expect my office to be cleaned and sanitized.” She throws her briefcase and purse down on Scarlet’s desk, the jacket soon following, Vanjie’s gaze following the jacket and back to the woman. Again, trying to maintain her irritation. 

“I would also like the department’s financial statements stacked neatly on my desk.” Brooke eyes A’keria, her confusion over where they could possibly be evident in her squinting, sideways glance. 

When the office finally reaches silence, caused by Yvie and A’keria’s worried glances and increasingly raised brow at the thought of the financial statements, the two of them both acutely aware of how quickly the department was sinking into something between quicksand and shit. Shitsand. 

The rest simply studied Brooke. The pressed white button down and cigarette pants. The creaseless leather pumps. The unflinching gaze. 

Of course, Vanjie breaks it.

“Uh, what’s an auditor?” 

It’s ghost quiet as Yvie, from behind Brooke, drags her finger across her neck, shaking her head furiously.

Scarlet drags her foot across the cracked peach tile. “Well, an auditor is a—” 

“Budget slasher,” A’keria interjects. She closes her eyes and inhales, hoping that someone will answer her prayers and make Brooke get out, and if not, will get A’keria out of here.

“Clean it. Now,” Brooke grits out before adjusting her shirt, picking an invisible piece of lint off of her and flicking it to the ground ceremoniously. “Director?” 

Brooke pivots and heads straight for Yvie’s office, letting Yvie know that again, Brooke isn’t asking questions, though her intonation would suggest otherwise. Yvie follows. Brooke slams the door behind them, sits on the edge of the chair in front of Yvie’s desk, and waves her hand behind her aimlessly. 

Yvie closes the blinds, leaving the team with a shaky thumbs up and a dorky smile as their only solace. 

Somehow, this day of government work would be longer than all the others. 


End file.
